Money Laundering Sends Mobster Back To Prison

May 21, 1998|By LARRY LEBOWITZ Staff Writer

Tommy Farese knew the drill. He gently folded his silk tie and removed his expensive leather belt, handing them to his wife before kissing her goodbye.

Farese, 55, a capo regime or ``made'' man in the Colombo organized crime family, on Thursday returned to prison after pleading guilty to laundering more than $1 million for undercover agents posing as Colombian crack dealers and for hiding his ownership in Broward and Palm Beach County strip joints.

The man who once was Fort Lauderdale's most famous mobster was returning to prison for six years to spare his wife, Suzanne, who was also charged in the case. Suzanne Farese is the daughter of Colombo underboss Alphonse ``Ally Boy'' Persico, who took the reins of the crime family in the late 1970s after his brother, Carmine ``The Snake'' Persico, was sentenced to 100 years in prison.

Suzanne Farese's voice was picked up on several key wiretaps among 19,000 intercepted by the feds during a six-month period in 1995 on cellular, home and business phones inside three strip joints. Prosecutors agreed to drop the charges against her in return for her husband's guilty plea.

The unspoken Mafia code of honor that keeps women and children out of the criminal enterprises and the intricate federal racketeering laws led to a highly complex three-day sentencing hearing. Despite the guilty plea, Chief U.S. District Judge Edward B. Davis had to determine the extent of Farese's role in the criminal enterprises.

``What harm to society was actually prevented here? What crime was stopped?'' Farese's attorney, Jon May, asked after the hearing. ``There was no money laundering until he was approached by government agents. They set him up.''

May convinced the judge that the government had failed to prove that the money laundering operation affected more than $1 million in interstate commerce. If they had, Farese could have been facing nine to 11 1/2 years in prison.

FOR THE RECORD - ******CORRECTION PUBLISHED TUESDAY, AUGUST 25, 1998******Because of a reporter's error, a May 21 story on the sentencing of organized crime figure Thomas Farese contained an incorrect reference to Miami businessman Juan Almeida.Almeida is not from Colombia. He is facing drug trafficking charges next month.We regret the error.

But assistant U.S. attorneys Jeffrey Sloman, Paul Schwartz and Robert Lehner won another key argument, convincing Davis that Farese was a leader and organizer of the money laundering and mail fraud conspiracies.

Had he not been caught in a government sting, Farese would have faced a slightly stiffer sentence, the judge said. Davis also gave Farese credit for being the first of all the defendants who eventually pleaded guilty.

The judge considered the way agents for the Drug Enforcement Administration and SWAT team members confronted Farese's wife, stepdaughter and grandchild shortly after raiding their home in January 1996. Farese tearfully left the courtroom on Tuesday while stepdaughter Tina Agostinelli testified about the raid.

Farese became entangled in the sting operation in late 1995, shortly before his release from prison after serving 14 years of a 24-year sentence on a 1980 marijuana smuggling and racketeering conviction. He was living in a West Palm Beach halfway house when the fake crack dealers approached Frank DeRosa, manager of Club Pink Pussycat in Hialeah, about laundering $1 million in drug proceeds.

DeRosa, who received a 33-month sentence on Wednesday, told the dealers he could clean their dirty money through several strip clubs with the help of an ``organized crime'' friend who turned out to be Farese.

Because of his 1980 conviction, Farese could not legally obtain a liquor license. But wiretaps revealed he maintained hidden interests through family and loyal associates in two clubs, Goldfinger at 3801 N. University Drive, Sunrise, and Club Diamonds at 1000 N. Congress Ave., West Palm Beach, and ties to several others. The mobsters ``cleaned'' more than $1 million in 12 separate exchanges and kept $95,000 in commissions.

In November 1995, Farese told undercover agents he could launder up to $500,000 a month by expanding the operation to other strip clubs, check-cashing stores, an Italian marble importer and other businesses.

But Farese still was unsure about his new partners. He and an associate checked them out with Juan Almeida, a Colombian drug trafficking acquaintance with his own ties to South Florida strip clubs and organized crime.

Almeida, who could not vouch for the dealers, is facing trial in another high-profile federal trial later this year. Almeida and Ludwig ``Tarzan'' Fainberg, owner of the Porky's strip club in Hialeah, are charged with trying to buy a Russian military sub to transport drugs from Colombia to eastern Europe.

Farese, who fired several lawyers and represented himself for a large part of the pretrial hearings, apologized to the judge for his behavior. May said Farese was more like co-counsel than client.

``Tommy's very much a self-educated man,'' May said. ``He's taught himself a lot about the law. If things had worked out differently, he would be on the [judge's) bench or CEO of a company. He's that smart.''